2 March 2025
They are almost done with clearing out the room that his mother used to sleep in. It is taking longer because Mother and Father are both old, and it costs money to hire help, the help will come from India or the Philippines, the help will have a language barrier with them, and something could be broken, discarded, or lost forever. There are a lot of things which would have to be thrown away, or given away, such as Jida Al-Shuhhy’s niqabs and hijabs that do not fit Mother. Father also sees a lot of trash. There are small pieces of broken wood and chipped tile, there are small dried rinds of kuboos which Jida Al-Shuhhy was fed but spat out due to her inability to digest. He sees olive pits and doesn’t know who was eating them. He sees tears in the bedsheets and holes in the pillows that he hadn’t noticed while Jida Al-Shuhhy was alive.
The room is almost empty. There are some remaining items which appear to belong to their household but actually came from Bin Asmad when they shifted her here. Such as the playing cards. They are on the dresser right by a box of costume jewellery and a clutter of pens and pencils. Father opens the deck and flips through the cards. Khamsa, heart. Thalatha, clubs. The queen of spades. The king of hearts.
To play cards in Islam is forbidden, and his mother was a devout Muslim. She was strict about never talking to men who weren’t part of the family, to dress in a way that revealed nothing but her eyes to strangers, to take each prayer seriously, and to make sure Father was caned when he needed it, like when he was a teenager and decided to study instead of going for salah.
And yet Jida Al-Shuhhy liked to play cards. She didn’t do it in public, or rather she couldn’t do it in public. There was a group of men whom she would meet and gamble with clandestinely. The results of her exploits with these men were never discussed amongst Father or his brothers. Their father was an open alcoholic during a time when any use of alcohol was heavily shunned in Emirati society, and so Father doubted whether he had the mental awareness to consider what his mother did beyond cleaning and cooking.
But these cards . . . what did they mean to his mother?
2 January 2030
Father sees Son sitting there, on the sofa, talking to an artificial intelligence program on his phone. For many reasons it feels like a dream. He hasn’t seen his son in years, probably in a decade, and there he is now, sitting on the couch, almost exactly as how he would when he was a teenager, his legs sprawled out and his attention on some gadget that distracted him from whatever was happening at home.
The other part that makes the whole scene feel dreamlike is the program, which is a hologram beaming directly outwards from the phone. Son is asking the program philosophical and practical questions. Is Dubai a good place for gay couples to live? What will the future be like in twenty years? The AI speaks with pause, consideration, and wit, its answers much sharper and precise compared to how the artificial intelligence programs spoke in previous years. The AI is in the shape of a kid’s cartoon character, but its answers seem as deep as Son’s question.
Father takes a seat next to Son. Son notices him. He shuts off his program and proceeds to ask Father some questions about his day, his life, his health. This is not his son of the previous decade. This is a son who is almost mature, responsible, and willing to consider the predicaments of his father.
Father responds, Son replies, and they both smile and chat enthusiastically.
This, too, seems as much a part of the dream.
Son asks Father a pointed question.
«؟So, what have you been doing the last few years to keep yourself busy »
Father puts on a smile and heaves a breath, as if he has a plethora of stories about what he has spent his time on in the last decade that would make Son happy.
Then the breath ends, and Father’s lungs feel empty. His smile disappears, his eyes lose concentration. Son waits for an answer, keeping on a patient smile.
Father is really reflecting on his answer. The truth is, nothing he did this past decade really compared to the moment when Son decided to come home. The idea of having his son back home with him was all he ever wanted. He is so happy that Son is here now, sitting on his couch, that no other thought comes to him.
He can’t tell this to Son right now. A father is meant to look like an authority figure, and that will be compromised if Father shares his true feelings.
But he has to at least say something to Son.
A thought clicks in the back of his head. A smile returns to his face. He will tell Son this particular story, related to a particular person who made Father the man he is today. It will show how Father has adapted since Son last saw him. Son will enjoy the story, and most important, he will feel happy for his father, as if Father’s time over the last decade was well spent without him.
15 May 2034
It is Father’s first time visiting Wynn Al Marjan Island. The island is shaped like a dragon, or a sea creature, or something fabled in a myth; something that could not have been made to look this way by nature. The sands of the beach are perfectly grained, the trees are planted in optimum places to project both beauty and shade. There is a giant incandescent tower in the centre of the island. That is where Son is taking Father, the two of them alone, to gamble.
Gambling is a sin in Islam. There was no place to gamble in all of the Emirates until this casino opened in 2027.Father wouldn’t normally have stepped into a place like this, but Son finally found the playing cards Father had tossed into his room and asked why they were there. When Father told him the story of how his grandmother had been addicted to card games, Son felt like the two of them ought to go here. Plus, Father was bored and didn’t have much to do except lounge about in the house.
The inside of the place is full of smoke. It is like being in a shisha café, only with the smell of tobacco. Father is not used to the thickness of the air. He coughs wildly, causing Son to laugh. Father shoots him a glare, which goes unnoticed. Father knows Son has always lived an independent life and has his own way of doing things, and that hasn’t changed.
People are playing poker in one area of the room. They are all foreigners, though some look like rich people of Arab origin, the kind who wouldn’t care whether they are breaking the laws of Islam, for they have already broken so many of the laws in the first place, or they just don’t believe in the religion. One of the players is a robot. It is a model that seems to be quite good at playing cards, but has been dumbed down so that it doesn’t automatically win against any of the players. It’s probably mostly used as a means to give tutorials to the newbies like Father.
Son motions for Father to sit with them. He feels like he ought to consult one of the robots before he starts. But the moment he touches the cards, he feels as if he is touching them with the hands of his mother. Memories of watching her play with her group of friends return to the forefront of his mind. He imagines how she cursed when she lost, how excited she would get whenever she won some money. He thinks about how difficult it must have been to hide such a hobby back before the Emirates opened up to the West.
Admittedly, certain practices were less observed during that time period, and people were less strict about adhering fully to the laws of Islam, so there might also have been ways in which it was easier.
Father sits. He doesn’t need the help of the robot. Son teaches him how to do it. He lays out the cards to the best of his abilities. They don’t win a single round and actually lose some money. But Father is having fun, and he is glad he has made the attempt.
Father tells Son: «.It is good to try new things .I am glad we came here »
Son laughs .
«.And yet you are the person whom I have seen try the least amount of new things in my entire life »
«.That is not true » Father says. «.I have changed in so many ways »
He feels like he has so many examples He got into fitness and lost a remarkable amount of weight from it. He tried a form of golf in which the ball was self-automated to make it easier for people who had trouble getting it into the holes, but the field had more hazards to make the game a challenge in another form. He decided to talk to one of the neighbours his mother never liked, and thy somehow became friends, despite her thick Somali accent in Arabic. Even today is a perfect example of putting himself out there to do something he isn’t comfortable with.
But Father sees the snide look on Son’s face. It doesn’t matter what Father says. Son still has a set expectation of how his father behaves, and it doesn’t matter how much Father opens up to him or is willing to learn life from his perspective. Son is stopped by the memories of the past, the very particular way in which Son has felt his father has failed him.
Finally, Father tells Son he has enough of this place and wants to go home. «Yalla » Son says, bemused, as if that was the response from Father he was ultimately expecting.
15 May 2041
It is a seethingly hot summer day. The temperatures are always sweltering, but with the changes in climate over the past decade, they have become a new level of unbearable. The temperatures go above fifty, and the dry desert winds desiccate any organism they touch. It is an unliveable place for any animal except those who are being grown in the air-conditioned zoos. As for the humans who reside in this city, it’s unthinkable to go out in the day. Father and Mother are rich, and so they have bought shades of lattice screen to cover their dwelling of two storeys. The air-conditioner is never not running in their house. And the walls and the roofs have been adapted with artificial intelligence that automatically knows when to cool the air, covering the window with metallic blinds and warning Mother and Father of the coming dust storms so that they never have to worry, as long as they never leave their cottage, another cooped-up place in this attempted deserted oasis.
Father is leaving to the gym. It’s too hot to walk there, and so Father orders a taxi from the chip on his head. It is not in his head, but it is programmed to electronically read his thoughts and communicate them through the Internet to whoever he is trying to communicate with. He thinks he wants a taxi, he negotiates the price through the signals being communicated from his head to the driver, and then the taxi comes, in seven minutes, right to his door.
Father is in his eighties. These days no one would know it. There are pills that keep away the effects of age. The pill injects nanobots into the body which aremelt away at excess fat stored between muscle and skin, ensuring that the body remains healthy and trim. . So Father has muscles all over his calves, stomach, and biceps. His hair is not grey but jet black from the hormone implants. The muscles in his face respond sharply as they would have when he was in his forties, and his eyes shine bright with energy.
In the gym a robot electronically asks what exercise routine he would like to do. Father will do one hour on the treadmill and weight machines. He gives his digital consent through the chip in his head, but taps his credit card on the robot’s head to do the payment. The robot charges him. He picks the treadmill right at the spot he likes it, with a view of glimmering turquoise water of the sea.
As Father runs, he glances around. Everyone is looking in perfect shape. He remembers when he first started at this gym. He was fat, but he wasn’t the fattest person there. There were people of all sorts of sizes and shapes at the time. Now everyone except, for the variations in race and height, looks exactly the same.
Still Father runs on the treadmill. It’s been his routine for the last two decades. He doesn’t know what he would do without it. It’s the only thing that has remained constant in his life.
Since the day his mother died.